PURPOSE
The purpose of this document, a follow up of three earlier and related
ones: Biblical Literalism - Part I
(1) and Part II (2) and Creation vs. Evolution -
Part I (3),
is to further disarm:
(a) the
enemies of God who may use what is
known as the "Theory of Evolution" to finally reduce the Holy
Scriptures to the category of "old wives tales"; and
(b) the enemies of science who may
use what is known as the "Theory of Creationism" to discredit
objective scientific work.
We will
do this in broad brush strokes - not trying to explain every
apparent
inconsistency in the Holy Scriptures and in scientific research
results, nor
attempting
to clarify
every
mystery
within the Holy Scriptures. That would
be presumptuous and
would defeat a secondary purpose of this document.
BACKGROUND
In our
Creation vs Evolution
document
(3) we
stated:
With their
Scientific basis
- Evolutionists proceed to "create"
living things from chemical elements that came from nowhere (as
scientifically
proven). This is a problem that man cannot begin to even fathom
- "nowhere" is a term defined by a Created environment, an environment
which did
not exist before creation. Thus, this "nowhere" cannot even be grasped
by the very feeble human
mind.
With their
Biblical basis
-
Creationists proceed to "create" living things from the literal
interpretation of Genesis. The problem is that their version starts
falling apart at the seams before even getting to Chapter Three of the
Book of Genesis. We read in Genesis two different stories about the
Creation of man: (a) the
simultaneous creation of Adam and Eve [Genesis
1: 26-28], and (b) the Adam first and Eve
from Adam's rib [Genesis 2: 7-24].
[Note, we are not questioning that if God, for example, said "There it
be light,"
light came into being. We are just highlighting two different Biblical
versions of a
single reality which cannot
be sustained by literalism.]
Now, this difference could possibly be smoothed over by a fast talking
fundamentalist preacher. The
real problem comes when we read:
"And
the Lord said unto him (Cain), Therefore
whosoever slayeth Cain,
vengeance
shall be taken on him sevenfold. And the Lord set a mark upon Cain,
lest any finding him
should kill him. And Cain went out from the
presence of the Lord, and dwelt in the land of Nod, on the east of
Eden. And Cain knew
his wife; and she conceived, and bare
Enoch: and he builded a city, and called the name of the city, after
the name of his son, Enoch." [Genesis 4: 15-17]
By whom is Cain afraid of being killed? According to our literal
population census
there are only three individuals in the world so far: Adam, Eve and
Cain. As if this situation were not enough, we must ask:
Where did Cain get that wife?
etc.
Now, this
real problem can
only be resolved with additional
Divine illumination, and, it is the Will of God that we now share with
the
world some of the Lights given to us about this apparently impenetrable
mystery.
INTRODUCTION
The clues to the answer to this apparent riddle are found
precisely
in the Book of Genesis, to be later confirmed in the New Testament, as
well as in
the Anthropological findings of the 19th and 20th
Centuries.
BIBLICAL PERSPECTIVE
Imagine
the Word of God going forth to command Creation. From that single
point (which
even the Big Bang theorists admit was so small that its size could not even
be mathematically established)
- i.e. from "nothing" - Creation starts to "unfurl" (4) in a pre
planned and protracted manner under the guidance of
the Perfect Wisdom of God.
What we now know as "Man" evolves under such guidance through a
number of species transitions and transformations
until the stage where God
Wills to make the "Man" of that stage into His (Spiritual) Image:
And he said:
Let us make man to our image and likeness: and let
him have dominion over the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the air,
and the beasts, and the whole earth, and every creeping creature that
moveth upon the earth. And God created man to his own image: to the
image of God he created him: male and female he created them. [Genesis
1: 26-27]
...and He really did.
But if we scroll down to the second Chapter of Genesis we see another
version of Creation - or is it? In this version we read:
1 So the
heavens and the earth were finished, and all the furniture of them.
2 And on the seventh day God ended his work
which he had made: and he rested on the seventh day from all his work
which he had done.
3 And he blessed the seventh day, and
sanctified it: because in it he had rested from all his work which God
created and made.
4 These are the generations of the heaven
and the earth, when
they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the heaven and the
earth:
5 And every plant of the field before it
sprung up in the
earth, and every herb of the ground before it grew: for the Lord God
had not rained upon the earth; and there was not a man to till the
earth.
6 But a spring rose out of the earth,
watering all the surface of the earth.
7 And the Lord God formed man of the slime
of the earth: and
breathed into his face the breath of life, and man became a living
soul.
[Genesis
2: 1-7]
Now, let us
superimpose
both Biblical versions of Creation and see what
we have. Could we perhaps find out who could
possibly be a threat to Cain's life as well as who Cain married?
We
certainly can, thus, let us
proceed.
ANTHROPOLOGICAL
PERSPECTIVE (5)
Let us first define three key terms:
She is believed by some to have lived
about 150,000 years ago in what is now Ethiopia,
Kenya or
Tanzania.
However, this
age estimate of 150,000 years can change if tomorrow, an earlier-dated
female's remains (with the same genetic coding) is found.
Naming Mitochondrial Eve after the Eve
of Genesis has led to some misunderstandings among the general public.
A common misconception is that Mitochondrial Eve was the only living
female of her time — she was not (had she been the single
mother of mankind, humanity would
have become extinct due to the law of probabilities).
Many women alive at the same time as Mitochondrial Eve have descendants
alive today. However,
only
Mitochondrial Eve group produced an unbroken line
of mitochondria that persists today.
Y-chromosomal Adam:
The name given by researchers to the patrilinear human man species
most recent common ancestor,
from whom all
Y chromosomes in living humans are descended.
Y-chromosomal Adam is thus the male counterpart of
Mitochondrial Eve.
They are named after the "Adam" and "Eve"
in Genesis
as a metaphor only.
The remains of the earliestY-chromosomal
Adam for living humans that have been found
probably lived between 60,000 and 90,000 years ago, judging from molecular clock and genetic marker
studies. Of course, as in the case of "Eve", this is always
subject to another find with an earlier date.
Single
Origin Concept: According to the single-origin concept,
every
species of the genus Homo but one, Homo
sapiens, eventually became extinct. The Homo sapiens evolved in
Eastern Africa
between 100,000 and 200,000 years ago and, in a
relatively recent exodus, began colonizing the rest of the
world.
According to the single-origin model, these more recent migrants did
not interbreed with the scattered descendants of earlier
exoduses.
In
support of it, advocates have drawn from both fossil
and DNA
evidence, in particular from mitochondrial and Y-chromosome DNA sequences.
DETAILS
Man seems to have evolved essentially as all other species
as we have
briefly explained above. When God deemed that "man" had reached "the
right
point" in its evolution, He breathed His Spirit into
a select group of them. Up
until now, this group of "men" had been an animal species, like other
animals. Now, they became totally different creatures. They were now
the Image of God, "
...male and female
He created them."
Now God relocated this select group of "Adams and Eves" to a special
place we know as Paradise or the Garden of Eden. The rest of
"mankind," whom God had not selected to receive His Spirit, remained
outside said Garden.
Once Adam and Eve broke their covenant with God by falling
into
satan's trap, they were thrown out from
Paradise
to live among those
from whom
they had been selected. Nonetheless,
they were truly and uniquely
different - they
had been given the Spirit of God and had become living souls. As we
read in Genesis Chapter 3
:
21 And the Lord God
made for Adam and his wife, garments of skins, and clothed them.
22 And he said: Behold Adam is become as one of us,
knowing good and evil: now, therefore, lest perhaps he put forth his
hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever.
23 And the Lord God sent him
out of the paradise of pleasure, to till the earth from which he was taken.
24 And he cast out Adam; and placed before the paradise of
pleasure Cherubims, and a flaming sword, turning every way, to keep the
way of the tree of life.
God
continued to look after His remnant, since they carried His Spirit.
(Even after their fall, they bore His Image within themselves).
Then, the colonization of the rest of the world commenced through
migratory waves from the general area the Garden of Eden was located.
Over time, those created in His Image proved to God, beyond the shadow
of
a doubt, that they simply could not understand how God wanted them to
live
so that they would work their way back to
a paradise-like
state.
Perhaps
living amongst (but not genetically mixing with) the non-selected
"mankind" was hampering His
people (the
descendants of the exiles from Eden) from fulfilling His Will.
Perhaps the interbreeding of the sons of God with the daughters of men
(6) was disrupting
the Divine Plan.
Obviously
it was time to purge the world of the non select ones, as well as the
descendants of the mixed breed [of sons of God and daughters of men].
Noah,
and what his story truly symbolizes, enters in the picture.
Regarding the Great Flood on an archeological/cultural
context....
(5)
No,
we are not denying
that the Noah we read about in the Holy Scriptures
ever existed. What we are proposing is that perhaps there were a
"number of Noahs" all over the world where the select had migrated and
lived amongst the non select. Those other Noah equivalents had the same
God-given function of the
Noah we know: To protect His elect while He was purging the world of
the undesirables, identified above, through a Great Flood.
With
the Flood, via their
local Noah equivalent, God had rid
the planet of those He deemed undesirables. All surviving mankind
everywhere now were descendants of those into whom God had
breathed
the Spirit of Life originally.
Eventually,
God made a covenant with Abraham. In essence, God now
carved
out a
group from the original elect, and made Abraham's
children His Chosen
ones; i.e. the group which became known as God's Chosen People.
Unfortunately, the Chosen People continued to rebel
against God.
Therefore, he started sending them Prophet
after Prophet in an effort to call his Chosen People to order.
However, no matter how many Prophets God sent, the Chosen Ones
remained
mostly blind and deaf.
At
the beginning of the End of These Times, as a last ditch effort, God
sent His Word Made
Flesh - Jesus Christ - to
explain to His Chosen Ones "the road map to Paradise" with words
and examples.
As
The Word was
rejected by the Religious Leaders of the original Chosen People,
others, from the non chosen
group, but certainly possessing the Spirit of God, (represented by the
Samaritans, Roman
Centurions, prostitutes, tax collectors, etc. - all of those who
would
accept Him (7) )
were included in the now expanded ranks of the "Chosen People".
This all-inclusive Divine Decision posed a symbolism challenge. All of
those
from the previously Chosen group were part of the covenant
with Abraham; a group which was marked by the circumcision -
something
externally visible.
Regarding circumcision in a non-Abrahamic context....
(5)
The practice of circumcision predates recorded human history,
with
depiction found in stone-age cave drawings and Egyptian tombs.
The origins of the practice
are lost in antiquity. Theories include
that circumcision is a form of ritual sacrifice or offering, a sign of
submission to a deity, a rite of passage to adulthood, a mark of
defeat
or slavery, or an attempt to alter esthetics or sexuality.
Circumcision continues to be performed as a religious requirement
on
members of the Muslim and Jewish faiths, and also the majority of
Americans, South Koreans and Filipinos.
The new Covenant sign became the Baptism which was and is,
in essence, a public sign of repentance for one's sins; an act which,
when undertaken with a sincere and contrite heart,
opens the doors of
the soul to the guidance of the Holy Spirit of God - a condition
which
is not physically visible. This Baptism - sign of the New and
Universal Covenant - is so important that it
was announced through the prophet Isaiah
[Matthew
12:17-18] and even
Jesus insisted that He be Baptized
as a matter of example to
all
[Matthew
3:16].
[This does not mean in any way that those who have not been baptized
will go to eternal damnation. God has provided for such
eventuality but that revelation is beyond the scope of this document.]
CONCLUSION
Now, as you review our previous and directly related documents [
(1),
(2), (3) and (6)] , with the additional
Light given in this document,
all
will become clearer and your Faith and trust in His Word
should increase further. The more that Faith grows, the more He will
reveals as we continue to drink from the Living Waters of the
Word of God manifested in
the
Sacred Scriptures.
Obviously
there is more, much more, light that would explain the many apparent
discrepancies and inconsistencies in the Word of God manifested
in the Sacred Scriptures. However, what we
have published so far should be more than enough to encourage readers to take
the Sacred Scriptures very seriously - with great trust and poise,
and devoid of any fanaticism.
EPILOGUE
It is interesting to note that if we view the First Coming of Jesus
Christ as the entering into a New Creation - call it a period of
re-Creation of mankind - the Baptism symbol (the Holy Sprit of God
descending upon an individual) appears to be an equivalent to when the
Creator "
breathed into his face the
breath of life".
May those who Eyes, See and Ears, Hear!
